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FEATURE

A few weeks ago, after an entire mountain lake the size of ten (10) football fields in a Chilean National Park mysteriously disappeared and left behind a 130 foot crater, scientists scratched their heads as to the cause.

The report goes on to say that Chilean glaciologist, Andre Rivera, noticed, while flying over the glacier that dammed the lake, a break in the glacier dam where the ice had thinned to the point where it could not hold the water back. As a result, the water rushed out to a nearby fiord and, from there, unnoticed into the sea.

On one side of the Bernardo glacier one can see a large hole or gap, and we believe that's where the water flowed through," Rivera said in a navy communique. "This confirms that glaciers in the region are retreating and getting thinner."

Rivera goes on to say: "This would not be happening if the temperature had not increased."

Would not have been happening, but, apparently, it did -- which leads to the inevitable conclusion that it is happening somewhere else (as reported in my earlier post here):

Our 'Gross National Happiness' is now threatened...

Bhutan's former king, Jigme Singye Wangchuck, an environmentalist who made the protection of resources the cornerstone philosophy of his nation, named his policy -- the idea that lifestyle and values were as important as material gains -- their: 'Gross National Happiness'.

But in this high Himalayan nation, lined by lakes and rivers -- a country that has done more than most to help the environment -- the sins of others have overwhelmed that policy, as twenty four of over two thousand glacial melt lakes threaten to spill over their natural dams due to glacier retreat.

Our Gross National Happiness...

How many nations?

Well...

Lake Chad, once one of the African continent's largest bodies of fresh water, has dramatically decreased in size due to climate change and human demand for water. Once a great lake close in surface area to North America's Lake Erie, Lake Chad is now a ghost of its former self. According to a study by University of Wisconsin- Madison researchers, working with NASA's Earth Observing System program, the lake is now 1/20th of the size it was 35 years ago.

It looks like someone pulled the plug out of the bottom of Lake Okeechobee.

Florida’s biggest lake is disappearing. Boats sit at docks surrounded by a sea of grass. Locks that normally move the boats into neighboring canals are now high and dry. At the giant fishing pier at the southern end of the town of Okeechobee on the lake’s north shore, locals and tourists come armed with cameras to walk on the pier and marvel at the water that is missing.

When Lake Jackson "disappeared," governmental agencies jumped in. The Northwest Florida Water Management District, along with state and local governments, were prepared to implement a massive clean-up plan to restore the lake to its previous ecological health and to its renown trophy largemouth bass days.

Global warming is destroying ponds that have supported life in the Arctic for thousands of years – bad news for the North and an ominous warning to the rest of the world, says a new report by two Canadian scientists.

The Gangotri glacier, which provides up to 70 percent of the water of the Ganges during the dry summer months, is shrinking at a rate of 40 yards a year, nearly twice as fast as two decades ago, scientists say.

"This may be the first place on earth where global warming could hurt our very religion. We are becoming an endangered species of Hindus," said Veer Bhadra Mishra, an engineer and director of the Varanasi-based Sankat Mochan Foundation, an organization that advocates for the preservation of the Ganges.

[snip]

According to a UN climate report, the Himalayan glaciers that are the sources of the Ganges could disappear by 2030 as temperatures rise.

So, Chile, The Himalyas, India, Africa, the United States, the Arctic, that drought in Australia that's been broken up for the moment by floods (but will it be back...? my guess? yeah), and then there's the one in Iceland and that one in Slovenia...

Which puts the global in global warming...

Here's the link to the MSNBC/AP article on the identification of climate change as the likely culprit in the disappearance of the lake in Chile.